Sierra Learns to Wield a Sword
by Chartic
Summary: A Kill Six Billion Demons crossover. After her brother is taken from the church by Merchants, Sierra, the foolish girl, is taken under the wing of Meti, the strongest Swordswoman in the multiverse. Now with the help of a beggar knight and a blue devil, she's off to save her brother.


Authors Note: Thank you to Poe, Pericardium, and Babagaia who beta'd this.

_Glory to the Divine Corpse, o breaker of infinites._

There came a time when Sierra decided she had to go back to the church and check for herself, despite the uncomfortable feeling of being a mouse coming back to a trap for the other half of the cheese. She told the group she'd left with and they bade her goodbye and wished her well. Every single one of them had known she wouldn't find him there, but no one said a thing. No one offered to go with her. No one even tried to stop her. They turned their backs and walked away.

She sloshed her way through swampy streets and climbed up over muddy embankments, tracing back the windy trail they'd taken in their escape. Bryce had to be there, she told herself. There was just no other way. She followed the smoke that trailed into the sky from where the Merchants had burned the church down and it wasn't long before she found it. The church smoldered, but the fire was gone. And so was her brother.

She spun in circles calling his name, tracing laps around the block to look for any sign of him. A body that lay face down in the muck was flipped with great hesitation, but it wasn't Bryce. It wasn't Bryce yet.

She shouldn't have gone inside the church, but she did without a thought. The building had blistered and blackened like a marshmallow in a campfire, but there was one pew left standing. A child had carved something into it that might have been a bear or might have been a bird. It was the only recognizable thing in the church. The mother had departed before the Merchants ever came, Sierra recalled. The child hadn't made it.

There were other places he could have gone to, she told herself. There were other people he could have gone with. It had been a haze of screams and fire. Not everyone had left the same way. There were camps he could be staying at. She wasn't sure she'd seen him taken, right? People managed impossible things before, defied improbable odds. But, did she really believe that? Bryce wasn't the kind to pull it off, no matter what he thought of himself.

In that church, Sierra finally broke down. Her anxiety had been building like a wave and crashed over her all at once. Her breath came out in a long whine and tears started pouring down her face as her body shook with sobs and gasps. She fell from her pulpit and curled up on the floor, pouring out everything inside of her until she was left sniffling and coughing.

"What should I do?" she whispered in a hoarse voice to herself.

"You should stop lying in the mud like a dog."

At the end of the row of pews sat a woman smoking from a long curved pipe. She leaned back against what remained of the charred outer wall. Her skin looked like it had been peeled off a corpse and left to tan, and her hair had long ago tangled together into one large messy clump. It was her eyes that drew you in, though, as they gleamed in the dim light and cut through Sierra deeper than the sword clenched between her legs could manage.

"What are you doing, you foolish girl? You sit in a church weeping over your brother? The world dies around you and one worm in this corpse is what breaks your spirit? Get out of the mud and stand."

She spoke to Sierra in a raspy voice that hit her with the force of a train. Sierra stuttered her way into an apology, but it collapsed into sobs before it ever got to a point.

The woman stood from her crouch and walked forward with quick and steady steps that cracked the floor beneath her feet. Her breath came out in hot angry bursts and even at a distance, Sierra could smell alcohol on it. She grasped Sierra by her armpits and hauled her out of the soot, then let go and Sierra collapsed back into the pew. The woman bent forward until their faces were inches from touching.

"Wh—what do you want?"

"I need to see if you are foolish enough to wield a sword."

"I don't have a weapon on me, I swear," Sierra said, pulling her pockets out in a hasty move that luckily didn't get her decapitated. "I don't have anything."

"There is nothing you could have that I would want, you stupid girl."

The woman pulled Sierra up by her shirt with a yelp.

"Tell me girl, those people—the ones that took your brother. What do you wish to do with them?"

Sierra said nothing and hung in the older woman's arms like a broken marionette.

"Look at me," she ordered with a tight voice that rattled Sierra's bones. "What would you do to them? If you had a chance to find the ones who took your brother, burned your home and killed these people, what would you do?"

"I can't, I've never even hurt someone before," Sierra babbled like a child.

The woman let go of Sierra and she collapsed back into her seat. "You are not ready to wield a blade. Good. Better for you to give up that hope and let your brother die."

"What?" Sierra asked, as the words fought to leave her throat.

The woman hung over her like an executioner, her face dark. "Your brother needs to be saved; how do you expect that to happen, girl? Will you go begging to the criminals of this city with your arms spread wide and tears in your eyes? You will find yourself taken as quickly as he was. Perhaps under a more gentle yoke, but a slave all the same. Will you go to your guardians patrolling the few streets worth their notice? Then your brother's death is already assured. Either he is saved by your hand or dies by another's. Accept his passing. Or did you lie? Wouldn't you stand by and watch these men as they tear out your brother's throat?"

"I'd… I'd stop them," she said as she wiped the tears from her face to try and look presentable. She felt as if she were being tested. This woman's will was a raging river and Sierra found herself unable to fight against the current.

"More. Tell me more. What would you do?"

"I'd kill them," she murmured into her shirt. "I'd kill them before they could hurt Bryce. I'd make sure they could never hurt a—"

"Useless."

The woman spoke this word, turned her back, and walked away. Sierra felt butterflies form in her stomach, writhing and raging in her guts like a frightened animal. With each step the woman took, Sierra felt an utter sense of helplessness overtake her. Thoughts of her brother's death echoed through her mind. She could see herself going to the heroes, the villains, begging anyone on the street for help, only to get sympathetic looks and pity. Then going to her parents to let them know. Bryce was gone. She was so sorry. She'd tried her hardest. But she hadn't, had she?

The woman reached the hole where the church's doors once stood. Sierra felt her breath start to come out in bursts. Her heart thudded in her chest and those butterflies turned into maggots that burrowed through the walls of her belly.

"I'd kill them!" she shouted at the woman's retreating back. "I'd kill them all. Every last one of them. I'd make sure they could never hurt a single person again for the rest of their miserable lives. I'd—I'd—I'd hurt them twenty times—a hundred times worse than what they'd done to all these people. I'd wipe them out till nothing was left. I'd kill them all!"

Sierra felt drained from vomiting up the black knot that had formed in her gut. The anger had been quick to light, but left nothing but coals in its wake, barely burning. The woman had stopped and turned to face her again.

"Would you?"

She made her way back until she stood only a sword's swing away from Sierra.

"Would you take pleasure in killing them, in seeing their vital juices pour from their bodies as they die."

Without the heat of her anger behind her, Sierra found the thought of it made bile rise in her throat. "No. No, I would never be happy doing..." she finished lamely, unable to voice the idea.

"Good. A man who finds pleasure in the result of cutting is the most hateful, crawling creature there is."

"I—I don't understand," Sierra said.

"You will."

She dropped into the seat beside Sierra and pulled a bottle from her robe that she started drinking from. The bottle disappeared and she spat on the floor.

"My name is Meti of no house, but myself."

"I'm Sierra."

Sierra stuck her hand out to shake, but the older woman ignored it.

"You're a cape, aren't you?" Sierra asked.

"You are a fool. No, worse than a fool. Even a fool would know better than to leap to their death like this."

Sierra didn't respond.

"He is dead to you. Forget him. Mourn with your family. Leave this city and find a happy life somewhere else."

Sierra felt something rising in her once again and couldn't tell if she was about to scream or cry. "He isn't dead yet, but they're going to kill him. I've heard what they do, I've heard about the fights. I can't just leave him, I could never face my parents. Please, you're a cape. Is there anything you could do?"

Meti fixed her with a blank stare. "Bringing him back will be worse than losing him forever."

"It doesn't matter. If it will save Bryce, I'll do whatever I have to do."

"And that is why you are a fool," Meti said as she stood, "but I believe you and I will help."

"Thank you," Sierra said, choking out a laugh that almost turned into a sob. "Thank you, I don't know how you're going to do it, but thank you."

"You foolish girl, I won't be the one bringing your brother back: you will. But, you will not go alone. I will find you two companions you will need for your journey. And I will give you the knowledge needed to save him."

Meti looked her in the eyes, taking no joy in the confused look that was affixed on the younger girls face.

"Always remember this, girl. Reach heaven through violence."

The hilt of Meti's blade bounced off Sierra's forehead and she fell bonelessly to the floor as everything went black.


End file.
